With lawsuits filed against four companies already, Rancho Cordova-based Internet Patents Corp. is preparing to file still more.

Internet Patents (NASDAQ: PTNT) is defending the patent rights of InsWeb, a Rancho Cordova insurance portal that was launched in 1995. Internet Patents was spun off as a successor company after InsWeb founder Hussein Enan sold the company to Bankrate.com for $64 million at the end of 2011.

Enan launched Internet Patents at the time of the sale and is now its CEO. The company has sued four large and established companies that use web technology as a primary part of their business.

“We are the inventors of these technologies. We have property rights and we want to enforce them,” said L. Eric Loewe, general counsel with Internet Patents. He was general counsel of InsWeb, starting there in 1998.

Other than its patents, the company has no other products. Internet Patents holds six patents and it has two more patent applications pending. The patents are for functionality inside of commercial websites.

“We are excited about our technology, and there should be companies interested in licensing it,” Loewe said.

The company has a reserve of more than $33.1 million in cash and cash equivalents which it can use to enforce its patents, according to the company’s most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“This technology is the work of our employees over the years,” Loewe said.

There is a lot of money in patent suits, said Mark Jacobs, Sacramento patent attorney. For many companies that are sued, it is often cheaper to settle than it is to fight it in court, he said.

The highest-profile patent suit that made it to court this year was Apple Inc. vs Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. A federal jury in San Francisco on Aug. 24 ruled primarily in favor of Apple and awarded the company more than $1 billion damages. That decision is on appeal.

Internet Patents’ most recent suit was filed Sept. 27 in U.S. District Court in San Francisco. That suit is against The General Automobile Insurance Services Inc. and The Active Network.

The Active Network (NYSE: ACTV) is a San Diego company that manages technology for clients. It has a market capitalization of more than $530 million. The General is a 50-year-old privately held Nashville, Tenn.-based insurance company.

The suits allege infringement of U.S. Patent No. 7,707,505, which has the title “Dynamic Tabs for a Graphical User Interface.”